Beijing: Lesbians in China's largest city, Shanghai, can get psychological help and support from a new hotline that opened this week, the first of its kind in the Communist nation.
Sponsored by a Hong Kong foundation, the free hotline is staffed by trained counsellors who are also lesbian or "lala" as they known in Chinese.
Many lesbians in China are pressured into marrying men and end up living miserable lives, sociologist Li Yinhe said.
She said the public and the families and friends of lesbians should be more understanding and tolerant.
Chung To, who heads the foundation called Chi Heng, hopes the hotline will provide real help for lesbians.
"We hire lesbians to operate the hotline because they have a better understanding of the pressures and stresses," said Chung who is an openly gay man, Xinhua news agency reported from Shanghai, the eastern metropolis.
While China has no official statistics on homosexuality, the Ministry of Health estimated at the end of 2004 that there were 5-10 million gay men in the country.
Some experts estimate the total homosexual population in China is at least 30 million.
Most gays and lesbians dare not declare their sexual orientation and are forced to find sex partners in places that make them vulnerable to HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases.
According to estimates, one per cent of gay men in China have contracted HIV.
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